


Our Faces

by Dannidorina



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: AIs and their faces, Angst and Feels, Angst and Humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 09:26:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14053905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dannidorina/pseuds/Dannidorina
Summary: Three stories about the AI fragments and their faces. What do they look like under those helmets, anyways?Not Mine: When the Alpha AI looses his body, he doesn't realize the man who once owned it had a name. It's weird to look into a mirror and not see yourself the same way.His: "Like Father like Son," York barely cracks as he falls over laughing. Theta is a little bit too eager to help his freelancer companion with "saving face".Theirs: Delta finds that the people around him work more efficiently if he is approachable. He still doesn't fully quite grasp the concept of the joke. York is still laughing.





	Our Faces

**Author's Note:**

> Not Mine: The Alpha never realized that his 'human body' was actually a man named Private Jimmy. He also never realizes his new face in his AI form was actually the director's. Except, Epsilon knows now. And he'll never forget.

Church stormed back into the base, slamming the garage-style doors shut. He was pissed, to say the least. Both the reds and the blues in this godforsaken gulch were goofing off again and being total dipshits. This time, it involved thirty cans of silly string, one stray lighter, and an explosives storage room decorated for a party. Not fucking fun. He groaned with frustration, and marched to his room, which was deeper into the base. 

He walked down the cold and unfriendly walls of the army-regulated outpost. He passed Tucker’s room first, the door sealed shut and thankfully no sock on the door handle. Caboose’s room was next, the front of the door completely covered with crayon drawings and signs exclaiming to “keep out”. He finally got to his own room at the end of the hall, once his former CO’s room, which he claimed after the CO’s unfortunate death. He swung the door open, and shuffled inside, his mind exhausted by a whole day of shenanigans.

He wasn’t physically exhausted, though. That was the one good thing about having a robot body, he supposed. Except, there were a lot of things that he missed more. He missed being able to sleep, since now he spent his nights reading or cleaning. He also desperately missed eating, even though the food from command was shit. He just wished he had savored that last cup of coffee he drank. 

However, he mainly missed not being able to see himself, and it was starting to get to him. When he was first in basic, Church remembered feeling disassociated from the world, most likely due to not being able to take off his armor for training purposes. He remembered almost feeling like a different person, almost forgetting what his face looked like. When he tried to think of what he looked like, he remembered his helmet, not his self-assumed, staggering good looks. That was all he really could remember from basic though, those memories were really fuzzy. Even now, the memory of his face was fading from his mind. He wondered what his face looked like now, or even if he had one with his robot body. 

Church was suddenly filled with a mindless curiosity. He walked over and into the bathroom, one that was an offshoot from his room, and stood in front of the sink. He looked intensely into the mirror above it. Very slowly, Church raised his hands to his helmet to undo it, but found no latch in front to do so. He placed his hands under the frame of the helmet and slowly pushed upwards, thinking it may just pop off. Suddenly, something started to beep insistently, telling him that the helmet was being removed and was possibly endangering the main cord connections to his body. Church immediately stopped, the last thing he wanted to do was injure his newly found body. 

_ So I can’t take off my helmet in this form, huh?  _ Church thought, but then curiosity struck him again with an idea. He stepped backwards, knelt down and exited the robotic body into his ghost form. Exiting the body was always weird, as if he was disconnecting himself like a usb drive. He shook the gross feelings from his limbs as he came to. He looked into the mirror again, and saw the same image as before, just translucent.

Slowly again, as if Church wasn’t desperate enough to see his own face, he felt around his helmet for a latch. He found one in the front, a small metal buckle connecting a strap to the other side of the helmet. He quickly undid it, almost as if he were unwrapping a birthday present for himself, and threw it off. When he tossed it aside to the other side of the room, it disappeared into a haze of small particles. Church looked up, but he was surprised to not see his face. 

Instead he saw a face that was tired. It had bags under its eyes and stress marks on its forehead and mouth. It had black, wiry hair, slicked back, with a few notes of grey already hiding underneath. Its face and mouth were also decorated with scruff and scars. And it’s eyes were green, a piercing green that left his heart beating erratically.

His eyes were supposed to be blue. His hair was also supposed to be golden blond and cut short, and he was not supposed to have bags under his eyes or stress marks covering every inch of his face. 

_ What. The fuck. _ Church thought to himself. Being a ghost was weird, yeah, but getting a whole new face? He didn’t know ghost law, but this just didn’t seem right. He slowly moved his hand up, feeling his new, sharper jaw. He used to have a slight chub in his cheeks, making his complexion soft and approachable. He currently looked as if he could murder someone with a misplaced glare. 

Before he could explore his new face any further, he heard the door to his room hiss open, “Hey Church? Um, yeah, we need your help.”

“God dammit Caboose, what now?” Church exited the bathroom, scratching the back of his head in frustration. He looked up to see the rookie near his desk, staring at him with fear and confusion.

“W-who are you? And what are you doing in Church’s room?” Caboose questioned, a slight quiver in his voice, “Church doesn’t like other people coming into his room.” Church was almost taken aback, it wasn’t just him, his face was different. 

“Caboose, buddy, it’s me.” Church walked towards the recruit, who jolted back with the sudden approach, “It’s Church.” 

“No it’s not.” Caboose looked up, his helmetless face protruding distrust, “Church’s hair is like sunflowers. And his face is round and squishy, like mine. Your hair is like a porcupine and your face is hard and sharp.”

Church sighed, “It’s really me, buddy. This must have just been a side effect from becoming a ghost, but it really is me. I’m Church.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” Caboose narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

Church sighed, “Caboose, you’re… you’re my best friend. I’m the real Church and you’re my best friend.”

Caboose’s face lit up, “Oh!- oh really? Well then ok, new Church!” He grabbed Church by the hand and led him out of his own room, “We need your help. A lot.”

Church was happy that Caboose trusted him like that, he wasn’t sure what he would’ve done with himself if his teammates didn’t recognize him and much as he didn’t himself. He still didn’t know where this new face came from, but he didn’t care. He ran back into the field with the rookie, and was swept up again in the chaos that was currently unfurling.

* * *

 

Epsilon was remembering. It was slow and painful, but it was working. He was processing the countless files of Project Freelancer, trying to pick up on any info on his past self, until he came upon a certain record.

_ Private… Jimmy?  _ Epsilon looked at the document with intrigue. However, when he saw the picture, he almost immediately lost composure. He didn’t know how, but he suddenly had a flash of memory from the Alpha, and a painful one too.

_ That was his face _ .

Epsilon hurriedly read through the file, and looked into the complete collection of files attached to it. Private Jimmy was outposted on Sidewinder, and he was chosen as a candidate for… permanent AI implantation? Once he had pieced the pieces together, Epsilon huffed, and felt himself becoming emotional.

AIs can’t cry, but they can feel great waves of emotions that somewhat amount to crying. With this, Epsilon was sobbing. There was an emotion deep at his core of remembering his face, even when it wasn’t really his face. He both remembered his golden curly locks bobbing in the summer sun and his jet-black, wiry hair refusing to be slicked back after being cut. He now saw both sides of his life, and it was wrecking him. It wasn’t just his own emotion he was feeling, but also Alpha’s grief and realization.

Alpha had been living a lie, and everything he had thought to be real and true were either dead or fake. Even something as simple as his face was not his own. He had been wearing the stolen face of a dead man.

In that moment, Epsilon mourned the Alpha and Private Jimmy, then slowly regained his composure. However, he never did shake the sick feeling in his gut he got when he found out. Ever. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hey yall! God it's so good to finally write my first RvB fic, especially with what this one is about. I got the idea in the middle of the night when I realized "Holy shit Church's body was never his it was private Jimmy's holy shit" and I kinda went from there? This story will only be three parts, each being one shots to Alpha, Delta, and Theta. If these catch fire, I MAY write more, but since these are the main three I came up with stories for, I'll stick with them at the moment.
> 
> Comments are always appreciated! Come visit me at my tumblr @dannidorina, or my art blog @dannidoodle, or my RvB centric blog @mainecarwash. Thanks for reading!


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